Fus. Joseph English
British Army 7th Battalion Royal Northumberland Fusiliers
from:Ashington
My Dad, Joseph English, went to France with the BEF in April 1940 aged 26. He was in the 7th Battalion, Royal Northumberland Fusiliers in the machine gunners assigned to the 51st Highland Division and was one of the men left behind to fight with the French to try and hold back the Geemans after the Dunkirk rescue.
He was captured at St Valery-en-Caux and marched to a POW camp Stalag IXC in Bad Sulza. He was then sent to a work camp where, because he had been a miner back in Ashington before the war, he was sent to a salt mine every day. Because of the poor food and conditions he had endured he eventually became very unwell with a perforated ulcer and other ailments and was sent to the camp hospital.
He was one of the soldiers to be repatriated in October 1943 by the Red Cross via Sweden on one of the hospital ships back to Leith in Scotland and then back by train to his home town of Ashington. He was the first POW to return to Ashington and had a heroe's welcome much to his disdain and had a visit from the local councillor and attended afternoon tea in his honour at the town hall.
